I remember one story of a DM who created a library of chaos for his campaign, based on a single word. There were months of visits, ending in a battle against a leather-bound paper dragon that breathed ink. When they killed the dragon, a demon revealed himself with a chuckle, saying “I see you’ve defeated my bookwyrm”.
One time I decided to name an enemy faction based on a bad pun. I told the players the name was chosen intentionally, and one of them especially was doing some moderate research to try to figure it out. When I finally played the pun a year later, everyone groaned. It wasn’t even a good pun.
Not that good you say?
I was waiting ages for someone to post this!
Still, better now than not at all, I suppose.
. . .
Omg I don’t have the words for that
I really wanna know that name now.
The game’s premise was “what if the head vampire in the city was basically Trump, and you’re all freedom fighters?” The bloodline was called the Publii. It was a setup so I could say something like
spoiler
“We publii can control the city! It will be terrible!”
That is, “Republican control the city! It will be terrible!”
It’s really bad. The grammar isn’t even quite right.
“Yeah, the Publii clan is annoying. Especially their leader. I’d go over it, but I already sent you an email about it. It should have the subject line ‘RE: Publii Khan’ or something”
“Oh, I’ve heard of the Publii clan before! I met one of their men, a Mr Danger. I think his name was Ken or something? He tried to warn me about something, but the guy just spoke in riddles, so it was hard to understand. I wonder what Publii Ken Danger meant…”
“Aren’t they those authors? They had a magazine about spending holiday time with your family instead of going abroad. Have you ever read the Publii-cation publication?”
See also hobgoblin mafia existing solely to be referred to as the hob-gob mob. And when players are sent to infiltrate them, it’s called the hob-gob mob job.
If you lean into it you can break people’s brains. “Here’s the key for their fat-cat leader’s ramshackle safehouse, so you can plant this explosive clay in his stove. It’s the Hob-Gob mob job’s hovel hob blob fob.”
Were they given the key or did they have to rob the Hob-Gob mob job’s hovel hob blob fob?
Ooh, a pre-heist. Getting close to the mafia leader’s fat ass is easy; be a waiter. But he only trusts his bloodthirsty wife. Anyone short could shapechange, but he has refined senses; even the scent of her lipstick has to be exact. You’d need a sample. Maybe from food where part comes back with the cutlery. A roasted vegetable with a rind or a core. Wipe that down to duplicate it, and a smoky room might disguise any other tells. Then a player can feed him some sedative-laced shrimp.
But that hob gob mob don prawn con obligates the kebab snob’s wackjob hearthrob cob swab.
I didn’t know Dr. Suess was a dm…
From the other site’s dndmemes:
A red rogue with a rouge rogue cloak?
He wears a brooch on his rouge rogue cloak. It’s a conversation-starter, when people broach the subject. A real confidence boost to boast about a rouge rogue cloak brooch broach. He worries that the brooch he bought ought not look tough enough, though. The thought thoroughly rubs this rouge rogue wrong, through and through.
I think I’m having a stroke
It’s DM vs player, but the DM is trying to catch the players by surprise with the biggest punchline instead of trying to kill the PCs.
I DMed a group that may have had an unexpected nighttime encounter with the bane of all adventurers: the dire rhea.
I not great with estimating sizes, and i often have trouble converting things from feet to meters on the spot. Last session i presented the players a quest to slay a sea monster. They cleverly decided to scout first with a familiar, and i described the creature and its size. I ended up exaggerating the size i bit too much and they’ve decided to avoid it until they’re higher level. So what was supposed to be a simple “monster of the week” type of encounter has now turned into a late game boss fight.
D&Dad
